The  Compulsory  Medical 
Inspection 

of 

School  Children 

B.  O.  Flower 


The  object  of  this  League  shall  be  to  disseminate 
information  pertaining  to , and  to  safeguard  through 
education  and  publicity,  the  rights  of  the  American 
people  against  unnecessary , unjust,  oppressive, 
paternal  and  un-American  laws  ostensibly  related 
to  the  subject  of  health. — Article  11,  League  Constitution. 


Natumal  Hrarjur  far  fHr&iral  iFrrrbam 

315  FOURTH  AVENUE 

NEW  YORK 


League  Library  No.  3 


Price  10  Cents 


1 


V T\$ 


I 

. 

THE  COMPULSORY  MEDICAL 
INSPECTION  OF  SCHOOL 
CHILDREN 


I.  Fundamental  Facts  to  Be  Considered 

The  earnest-minded  thinker  who  would  reach  the  truth  on  any 
subject  will  first  consider  the  fundamentals  involved,  (i)  He  will 
examine  the  premises  and  assumptions  on  which  the  argument  or  claim 
is  based,  and  see  if  they  are  sound.  (2)  He  will  consider  whether  the 
proposed  remedies  are  fundamental  or  whether  they  are  merely  aimed 
at  effects  and  are  palliative  instead  of  root-searching  in  character. 
(3)  If  they  are  superficial  rather  than  basic,  being  addressed  to  effects 
rather  than  touching  root  causes,  he  will  carefully  consider  whether 
they  may  not  be  attended  by  ,evils  greater  than  the  evils  they  would 
remedy;  and  (4)  he  will  seek  to  ascertain  whether  or  not  they  are 
being  advanced  by  interests  that  desire  to  divert  attention  from  the 
root  causes  of  the  evils,  or  by  special  interests  or  classes  looking  for 
financial  emolument  and  increase  of  power  through  the  proposed  reme- 
dies. 

II.  Present  Status  and  Trend  of  the  Movement 
for  Compulsory  Inspection 

Before  considering  at  length  the  question  of  compulsory  examin- 
ation of  school  children,  let  us  note  the  present  status  and  tendency  of 
this  new  innovation.  The  inspection  of  schools  by  medical  examiners  at 
first  was  demanded  only  as  a preventive  measure  in  times  of  epidemics 
from  contagious  diseases,  the  purpose  being  to  protect  healthy  chil- 
dren from  exposure  to  contagion.  Next  came  the  demand  that  healthy 
children  be  inoculated  with  virus,  whether  the  parents  consented  or 
not.  Compulsory  vaccination  meant  an  increased  revenue  of  many 
thousands  of  dollars  to  the  doctors  in  every  community,  but  it  was 
also  followed  frequently  by  serious  and  at  times  fatal  results.  In  the 
belief  of  a large  number  of  highly  intelligent  people,  including  not  a 
few  scholarly  physicians  and  scientists,  vaccination  is  a fruitful  cause 
of  the  spread  of  tuberculosis  and  other  diseases,  while  not  preventing 
smallpox  on  the  one  hand  and  on  the  other  rendering  a community  less 


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vigilant  in  regard  to  real  preventive  measures,  such  as  proper  sanita- 
tion, notification  and  isolation.  Thus  we  find  that  the  first  step,  the 
innnocent  and  unobjectionable  examination  of  school  children  by  phy-t 
sicians  to  protect  the  healthy  from  contagion,  was  followed  by  the\ 
insistence  on  compulsory  medication  by  the  employment  of  a treat- \ 
ment  that  was  repulsive  to  a large  number  of  the  intelligent  citizens  ) 
and  about  the  value  of  which  even  the  dominant  medical  school  is  ( 
by  no  means  of  one  opinion.  This  proposal  for  compulsory  medica-  * 
tion  was  followed  by  a campaign  of  education,  conducted  by  the  polit- 
ical doctors  of  the  American  Medical  Association,  for  compulsory 
examination  of  all  school  children  to  ascertain  their  physical  condition 
and  determine  whether  or  not  various  organs  were  defective  or 
abnormal ; for  example,  whether,  in  the  opinion  of  the  political  doctor, 
the  child  was  suffering  from  adenoids,  enlarged  tonsils,  defective  teeth, 
impaired  eyesight  or  hearing,  whether  his  heart  was  weak  or  his  lungs 
diseased. 

Since  a tentative  acceptance  of  the  proposition  in  several  cities  and 
states,  the  demand  has  been  further  advanced  that  specialists  for  the 
eyes  and  ears,  and  psychologists,  be  added  to  the  general  corps  of 
state-supported  physicians.  Thus,  for  example,  on  February  the 
seventh,  at  a health  conference  in  Baltimore,  a distinguished  physician, 
Dr.  Henry  H.  Goddard,  declared  that  two  per  cent,  of  the  children  in 
all  public  schools  are  mentally  defective,  and  he  insisted  that  psycholo- 
gists should  be  appointed  to  examine  all  public  school  children,  while 
in  various  other  cities  a demand  is  now  being  advanced  that  nurses 
be  added  to  the  medical  examining  staff,  whose  duties  shall  be,  accord- 
ing to  a prominent  medical  examiner  in  a western  state,  “to  go  into  the 
homes  of  the  children  and  see  that  our  instructions  (those  of  the  exam- 
ining doctors)  are  carried  out.” 

Here  the  autocratic  spirit  of  the  new  medical  hierarchy  is  clearly 
voiced.  However  honeyed  the  words  that  may  be  used  by  the  political 
doctors  advocating  compulsory  medical  examination,  the  fact  remains 
that  the  ultimate  aim  and  master  purpose  of  those  who  are  chiefly 
responsible  for  the  present  campaign  in  the  interests  of  the  trust-seek- 
ing medical  doctors  was  clearly  and  authoritatively  voiced  by  Dr. 
Samuel  G.  Dixson,  of  Pennsylvania,  in  a contribution  to  the  official 
organ  of  the  American  Medical  Association,  in  which  he  said : “Com- 
pulsion, not  persuasion,  is  the  key-note  of  State  medicine.  . . . 

These  laws  must  reach  into  all  the  relations  of  life.” 

This  brings  us  to  an  examination  of  the  major  points  involved  in 
this  grave  question. 

III.  Is  the  Premise  Sound? 

In  the  presence  of  conditions  that  are  admittedly  far  from  ideal,  all 
right-minded  citizens  will  admit  the  importance  and  desirability  of 
remedies  that  will  meet  the  exigencies  of  the  case.  But  when  remedies 
are  advocated,  it  is  the  bounden  duty  of  intelligent  citizenship  to 
determine  whether  the  proposed  treatment  rests  on  false  premises  and 
whether  it  is  fundamental  or  palliative  in  character ; whether  it  is  the 
child  of  conservative  and  reactionary  prejudice,  of  dogmatic  assump- 
tions, of  selfish  interests  and  the  lust  for  power  and  wealth  on  the 


4 


part  of  a privilege-seeking  class,  or  whether  it  is  the  fruit  of  a broad, 
philosophical  and  statesmanlike  vision  that  fronts  the  future  and  seeks 
the  underlying  principles  that  make  for  justice  and  full-orbed  develop- 
ment of  life.  To  illustrate : 

When  Spain  found  herself  possessed  of  large  territories  in  the  New 
World,  and  saw  that  they  could  yield  in  the  greatest  abundance  every 
agricultural  product  known  to  Southern  Europe,  and  had  the  facilities 
for  both  intercolonial  and  international  trade,  she  protested  that  she 
had  not  discovered  and  peopled  these  territories  to  ruin  her  own  agri- 
culture and  industries  and  that  it  was  preposterous  for  her  colonies 
to  expect  the  Mother  Country  to  countenance  such  a suicidal  policy. 
Accordingly  each  colony  was  kept  from  the  slightest  intercourse 
with  its  neighbor,  and  no  foreigner,  on  pain  of  death,  might  enter  or 
even  trade  with  this  vast  region.  Furthermore,  having  destroyed  all 
outside  markets,  she  proceeded  to  prohibit  the  exportation  of  agricul- 
tural or  industrial  products  to  her  own  ports.  In  short,  obsessed  with 
the  idea  that  Colonial  prosperity  meant  her  own  ruin,  she  stifled  for 
centuries  the  development  of  an  area  many  times  larger  than  all 
Europe,  and  finally  accomplished  exactly  what  she  set  out  to  prevent. 

No  one  denies  that  it  is  expecting  too  much  of  a country,  whether 
it  be  a proud  monarchy  or  a republic,  to  injure  its  own  resources  that 
a distant  colony  may  benefit  thereby,  but  the  premises  in  this  case  were 
absolutely  and  fundamentally  false,  and  so  gave  rise  to  the  most  monu- 
mental error  that  political  economy  has  any  record  of. 

Again,  when  the  apostles  of  popular  sovereignty  proclaimed  the 
fundamental  principles  of  democracy,  the  upholders  of  the  throne  and 
aristocracy  at  once  raised  the  cry  that  the  best  interests  of  society 
demanded  orderly  advance,  a reign  of  law  that  should  guarantee  the 
protection  of  the  life  and  property  of  the  people  from  wholesale  mur- 
der, despoliation,  license  and  anarchy,  which  would  follow  and  mark 
any  society  where  the  people  were  the  ruling  power.  Now,  the  impor- 
tance of  avoiding  the  chaos  of  a society  plunged  in  anarchy  and  at  the 
mercy  of  unbridled  lawlessness  was  everywhere  admitted,  and  on  the 
assumption  that  any  popular  rule,  or  rule  that  secured  for  the  people 
the  power  which  the  king  and  privileged  classes  had  arrogated  to  them- 
selves, would  result  in  lawlessness,  murder,  rapine  and  the  destruction 
of  property,  the  upholders  of  the  old  order  strove  to  terrify  the  people 
and  prevent  this  great  fundamental  advance  step  in  government. 

History  is  full  of  similar  illustrations,  but  these  typical  examples 
will  serve  to  show  the  fact  we  wish  to  emphasize.  In  the  latter  case, 
more  particularly,  it  will  be  observed  that  a general  truism  is  stated 
about  which  there  is  no  controversy,  followed  by  inferences  plausible 
to  superficial  thinkers  and  those  who  are  in  the  habit  of  taking  their 
opinions  from  others,  yet  which  are  seen  in  the  light  of  history  to  be 
absolutely  sophistical ; and  the  premise  being  false,  the  conclusions  ad- 
vanced by  the  privileged  classes  desiring  to  continue  in  power  are  not 
valid.  The  contention  that  a large  proportion  of  those  who  stood  with 
the  king  and  aristocracy  in  their  warfare  against  popular  sovereignty 
were  sincere  in  no  way  affects  the  fundamental  facts  involved.  The 
premise  was  unsound,  and  the  proposals  fallacious  and  against  the  best 
interest  of  the  people.  This  impressive  historic  illustration  shows  the 
importance  of  ascertaining  whether  a premise  is  sound  before  we  ac- 
cept the  proposed  cure. 


5 


We  are  told  that  a great  number  of  school  children  are  in  poor 
health,  and  that  it  is  desirable  that  the  young  be  in  physical  condition 
to  enjoy  to  the  greatest  degree  the  benefits  of  their  school  training; 
and  following  on  the  heels  of  this  truism  the  American  Medical  Asso- 
ciation and  its  allies  advance  the  assertion  that  the  remedy  is  to  be 
found  in  compulsory  medical  inspection  by  an  army  of  political  doctors 
or  state-appointed  physicians.  We  believe,  however,  that  a rational 
consideration  of  this  question  will  show  that  the  premise  is  unsound 
and  the  proposed  remedy  not  only  superficial  in  character  but  fraught 
with  far  greater  evils  than  any  potential  benefits  that  might  result 
from  its  enforcement. 

The  evils  complained  of  among  the  school  children,  as  we  shall 
presently  see,  are  largely,  if  not  chiefly,  due  to  fundamentally  unjust 
economic  conditions ; to  the  general  indifference  of  society  in  regard 
to  the  rights  of  the  poor  and  dependent,  and  to  ignorance  on  the  part 
of  the  unfortunate  ones,  concerning  great  and  universally  admitted 
facts  relating  to  health  and  sanitation.  To  meet  this  condition,  a 
great  privilege-seeking  class  demands  compulsory  inspection  of  chil- 
dren, to  be  followed  by  compulsory  medication.  This,  we  claim,  is 
not  only  a proposal  for  a remedy  necessarily  palliative  in  character 
and  based  on  a false  premise,  but  the  remedy  is  fraught  with  the 
gravest  evils  at  once  to  the  young , to  the  citizen,  to  the  nation  and  to 
the  cause  of  scientific  advancement. 

IV.  Palliative  Treatment  Advanced  by  a Privileged 
Class  in  Lieu  of  Fundamental  Remedies 

One  of  the  greatest  defects  in  our  present-day  attempts  to  grapple 
with  evil  conditions  lies  in  our  proneness  to  seize  upon  some  superficial 
remedy  advanced  by  interested  parties,  who  claim  that  its  adoption 
would  afford  immediate  relief,  without  first  discovering  the  real  or 
root  causes  of  the  evil  condition ; and  as  a result  we  adopt  palliatives 
or  remedies  of  doubtful  benefit.  Such  action  is  analogous  to  applying 
a plaster  to  a repulsive  sore  without  attempting  to  destroy  the  cause 
of  the  eating  ulcer.  In  no  field  are  the  unhappy  results  arising  from 
this  kind  of  treatment  more  apparent  or  more  far-reaching  in  unfor- 
tunate results  than  in  the  realms  relating  to  the  physical,  mental  and 
spiritual  life  of  the  people. 

It  is  assumed  that  the  employment  of  an  army  of  state-salaried 
physicians  to  examine  the  school  children  of  the  land  would  result  in 
benefits  so  positive  as  to  warrant  the  outlay  of  the  enormous  and 
constantly  increasing  expenses,  required  to  meet  the  salary  roll  of 
an  ever-augmented  army  of  state  physicians.  Now  at  the  very  out- 
set this  claim  will  be  found  to  be  open  to  serious  question.  Indeed, 
there  are  valid  reasons  for  believing  that  the  introduction  and  prose- 
cution of  the  proposed  innovation  will  in  the  long  run  result  in  greater 
injury  than  benefit  to  the  young;  and  the  subject  is  so  gravely  impor- 
tant that  conscientious  educators  and  parents  should  not  permit  alluring 
sophistries  or  glittering  generalities  based  on  unsound  premises  to 
prevent  their  making  a careful  and  impartial  study  of  all  sides  of 
the  issue. 


6 


(a)  The  evil  of  creating  fear  in  the  child  mind.  Modern  psy- 
chological research  has  demonstrated  few  facts  so  conclusively  as  that 
fear  is  one  of  the  greatest  promoters  of  disease.  It  not  only  depresses 
the  victim  and  makes  him  negative,  but  in  cases  where  a physician 
or  one  in  authority  has  suggested  danger  to  some  organ  from  disease, 
or  hinted  at  the  possible  presence  of  disease,  the  fear-laden  thought  of 
the  patient  is  constantly  centered  on  the  organ  supposed  to  be  weak 
or  specially  susceptible  to  disease,  and  this  negative  condition  of  the 
mind  filled  with  brooding  fear,  favors  as  doe$  nothing  else,  the 
encroachment  or  rapid  advance  of  disease.  This  is  a fact  so  well 
established  that  the  ablest  and  most  scientific  physicians,  no  less  than 
psychologists,  constantly  strive  to  divert  the  patient’s  mind  from 
disease. 

Furthermore,  what  is  true  of  the  baleful  effects  of  fear  on  the 
adult  mind  is  doubly  true  of  its  effects  on  the  plastic  and  highly 
imaginative  mind  of  the  child.  At  no  time  in  life  do  we  receive  such 
lasting  impressions  as  in  childhood,  and  at  no  period  of  life  is  fear 
more  potent  for  evil  than  then.  The  disastrous  effect  of  creating  alarm 
in  the  mind  of  the  child  and  having  those  dread-laden  thoughts  cen- 
tered on  its  body  or  some  organ  of  the  body,  cannot  be  over-estimated. 
Indeed,  if  we  concede  the  possible  good  results  which  sinecure-seeking 
political  doctors  would  have  us  believe  would  result  from  compulsory 
medical  examination — something  which  we  do  not  for  a moment 
admit — we  believe  that  the  evil  resulting  from  the  compulsory  dissem- 
ination of  fear  that  must  necessarily  follow  the  proposed  examination, 
would  far  overbalance  the  good  claimed  for  it. 

Nor  is  this  all.  It  is  gravely  proposed  to  have  specialists  employed 
for  the  examination  of  the  children ; and  what  fact  in  medical  history 
is  better  established  than  the  proneness  of  a specialist  to  find  what 
he  is  looking  for,  even  though  he  may  not  be  swayed  by  cupidity  or 
any  selfish  motive? 

A number  of  years  ago  one  of  the  New  York  World's  ablest 
correspondents,  Nellie  Bly,  visited  some  five  famous  New  York  special- 
ists, giving  each  exactly  the  same  set  of  symptoms,  and  each,  after 
hearing  her  and  carefully  examining  the  patient,  declared  her  case 
to  be  one  involving  an  abnormal  condition  of  the  organ  he  specially 
treated , and  each  prescribed  special  treatment  for  the  diseased  condi- 
tion he  supposed  he  had  discovered.  Here  the  reporter , who  was  as  a 
matter  of  fact,  in  excellent  health,  was  declared  by  distinguished 
regular  specialists  to  have  five  different  diseases  involving  as  many 
organs  of  the  body.  A number  of  similar  illustrations  might  be  cited 
showing  this  proneness  of  a medical  specialist  to  find  what  he  is 
looking  for0 

Now  under  the  proposed  system,  the  arousing  of  fear  in  the  child’s 
mind  and  the  centering  of  his  thoughts  during  the  most  plastic  period 
of  life  on  some  organ  supposed  to  be  affected  or  liable  to  disease, 
would  work  incalculable  injury ; while  with  highly  sensitive  and  imag- 
inative children  the  doctor’s  dictum  would  seriously  impair  the  health, 
and  at  times  prove  fatal  to  the  youthful  victim.  A tragic  and  impres- 
sive illustration  of  this  character  is  found  in  the  following  news  item 
from  the  New  York  American,  for  February  5th,  1911: 

1 


"Mrs.  William  Rague,  of  Sherry  Lane,  West  New 
Brighton,  Staten  Island,  appeared  before  Health  Commis- 
sioner Lederle,  in  Manhattan,  yesterday  and  made  complaint 
against  Dr.  Millicent  Hopkins,  a woman  doctor  attached  to 
the  Richmond  Borough  Board  of  Health. 

"Mrs.  Rague  told  the  Commissioner  that  her  daughter 
was  a pupil  in  the  West  New  Brighton  Public  School.  During 
the  early  part  of  November,  she  said  that  Dr.  Hopkins,  who 
was  examining  pupils  at  the  school,  called  her  daughter  out 
of  a line  of  children  and  told  her  that  she  had  heart  trouble. 

Mrs.  Rague  said  that  her  daughter  came  home  to  her  in  a 
highly  nervous  state. 

"Mrs.  Rague  says  her  daughter  worried  herself  into 
sickness  and  for  days  refused  to  take  nourishment.  She  says 
she  called  in  her  family  physician  and  that  the  latter  told  her 
that  there  was  nothing  the  matter  with  her  daughter’s  heart. 

"Despite  this  information,  she  says  her  daughter’s  con- 
dition grew  worse  and  that  on  December  5th  she  died. 

"Mrs.  Rague  told  the  Commissioner  that  she  believed 
what  Dr.  Hopkins  had  told  her  daughter  caused  her  death.” 

(b)  Compulsory  inspection , to  be  effective , must  be  folloived  by 
compulsory  treatment . If  this  compulsory  medical  examination  of 
school  children  is  to  prove  effective,  one  of  two  things  must  follow. 
Either  the  parents  must  carry  out  the  treatments  prescribed  or  sug- 
gested by  the  medical  officials  or  other  doctors,  and  those  who  do 
not  believe  in  the  methods  of  practice  advocated  by  the  state  physicians 
or  those  who  do  not  think  they  can  afford  the  expensive  luxury  of 
experimenting  with  doctors,  must  be  made  to  obey  the  medical  officials, 
or  else  the  state  or  city  must  go  into  wholesale  dispensary  business  and 
the  young  of  the  community  must  be  turned  over  to  a number  of 
doctors  whose  lack  of  success  has  made  it  necessary  to  seek  state  aid 
in  obtaining  business,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  a large  proportion  of  the 
parents  of  the  young  look  with  abhorrence  on  the  system  of  treatment 
represented  by  these  same  doctors.  For  it  would  be  clearly  absurd  for 
the  state  or  city  to  go  to  the  expense  of  compulsory  examination  if 
there  was  to  be  no  method  of  compulsion  at  the  heels  of  the  first 
compulsory  step  demanded  by  the  American  Medical  Association ; 
hence  the  demand  for  nurses  to  go  into  the  homes  and  compel  com- 
pliance with  the  doctors’  directions. 

(c)  Compulsion  in  theoretical  Helds  unjust  to  the  individual  and 
inimical  to  scientific  advance.  And  this  brings  us  to  one  of  the  most 
serious  and,  to  thinking  men  and  women,  the  most  important  point 
for  consideration.  Medicine  is  not  a science.  The  most  that  can 
truthfully  be  said  by  its  most  enthusiastic  advocates  is  that  it  is  a 
progressive  art ; and  compulsion  in  theoretical  or  empirical  fields  is 
manifestly  opposed  to  the  great  fundamental  principle  of  freedom 
that  is  so  largely  responsible  for  the  scientific  advance  of  Western 
civilization  since  the  dawn  of  the  democratic  era.  It  is  opposed  to 
the  sacred  rights  of  the  people  and  is  inimical  to  sound  intellectual 
progress. 

In  realms  of  research  that  relate  to  commercial  business,  such, 
for  example,  as  the  increasing  of  the  productivity  of  the  land  and 

8 


other  measures  for  adding  to  the  material  wealth  of  the  people,  in  fields 
that  are  not  speculative,  government  may  rightly  go  far,  always  provid- 
ing it  does  not  by  such  action  interfere  with  the  moral  rights  of  the  peo- 
ple or  advance  the  wealth  of  the  privileged  classes  at  their  expense.^ 

But  when  it  comes  to  an  empire  of  speculative  thought,  other 
grave  factors  are  involved,  as  has  just  been  pointed  out,  and  this  is 
especially  true  where  the  theories  and  assumed  facts  relate  to  matters 
so  vital  to  the  individual  and  civilization  as  one’s  physical  or  spiritual 
health,  and  when  the  proposed  legislation  might  add  to  the  power, 
prestige  and  pecuniary  advancement  of  a class  that  has  striven  to 
crush,  outlaw  and  proscribe  those  holding  contrary  views  and  theories 
in  regard  to  health,  and  to  take  from  the  individual  the  right  to  enjoy 
the  medical  or  the  spiritual  adviser  of  his  choice. 

The  most  momentous  battle  fought  by  Western  civilization  was 
for  that  freedom  of  thought  which  alone  made  scientific  advance  pos- 
sible, that  enabled  the  human  mind  to  emancipate  itself  from  the 
slavery  of  ignorance,  superstition  and  dogmatism,  and  whose  first  great 
victory  was  followed  by  the  establishment  of  religious  freedom  in  many 
lands,  a sensible  respect  for  the  right  of  the  individual  in  matters  relat- 
ing to  his  spiritual  as  well  as  physical  well-being,  and  a recognition  of 
the  political  rights  of  man  which  ushered  in  the  democratic  era. 

In  the  domain  of  religion  and  medicine,  speculative  theories  rather 
than  scientific  demonstrations  hold  sway.  It  is  true  that  there  are  a 
few  doctors  who  claim  that  medicine  is  scientific  rather  than  specula- 
tive ; but  the  fact  that  our  various  great  schools  of  medicine  teach 
diametrically  opposite  theories  and  have  armies  of  human  documents  in 
the  way  of  cures  where  rival  schools  have  failed,  and  the  further  fact 
That  there  are  in  the  land  millions  of  people  whose  unhappy  experience 
with  the  old  school  practice  has  led  them  to  seek  and  find  health  in 
schools  and  methods  of  practice  that  are  denounced  as  false  by  the  old 
school  and  which  the  American  Medical  Association,  through  its  state 
organizations,  is  vigorously  seeking  to  outlaw,  prove  that  the  older  and 
more  powerful  school  of  practice  is  empirical  rather  than  scientific. 

This  is  frankly  admitted  by  many  of  the  world’s  greatest  physi- 
cians and  scientists,  albeit  usually  on  the  announcement  of  some  new 
system  which  is  to  forever  remove  this  stigma  of  empiricism.  As  an 
example  we  note  a popular  article  by  Dr.  Leonard  Keene  Hirschberg, 
of  Johns  Hopkins  University,  which  sets  forth  the  wonders  of  Sir 
Aimroth  E.  Wright’s  famous ‘‘Opsonic  Theory.”  Says  Dr.  Hirschberg: 

“To  put  it  briefly,  Wright’s  purpose  is  to  bring  order  out  of  the  chaos 
of  medical  experiment — to  make  diagnosis  exact,  to  reduce  dosage  to 
figures  and  formulae,  to  make  it  possible  to  determine  with  accuracy  not 
only  what  ails  a patient,  but,  also,  what  remedies  to  give  him  and  how 
much,  and,  finally,  to  find  out  exactly  whether  he  is  getting  worse  or 
getting  well.  The  laymen  may  fancy  that  doctors  know  all  of  these  things 
now;  but  it  is  not  so.” 

Moreover,  in  no  field  of  scientific  advance  have  there  been  such 
constant  changes  in  accepted  theories — such  discarding  to-day  of  what 
was  generally  accepted  yesterday,  as  in  the  old  school  of  medical 
practice ; which  further  confirms  our  position  that  medicine  is  theo- 
retical rather  than  scientific.  And  since  this  is  true  of  the  healing  art, 
here,  as  in  all  fields  of  theoretical  speculation,  the  cause  of  true  science, 
no  less  than  that  of  human  rights,  demands  freedom  for  the 


9 


individual  to  select  the  practitioner  or  adviser  of  his  choice,  without 
any  legal  restrictions  that  would  render  such  freedom  impossible. 

(d)  An  historical  illustration  showing  the  danger  of  compulsion. 
The  history  of  medicine  is  not  only  the  history  of  continual  acceptance 
and  discarding  of  widely  differing  theories,  but  the  latest  accepted 
theory  that  obsesses  the  medical  imagination  is  always  assumed  to  be 
the  truth,  and  an  army  of  human  victims  have  to  be  sacrificed  on 
the  altar  of  the  latest  fetish  before  it  is  possible  to  rid  the  medical  mind 
of  its  obsession.  One  impressive  and  thoroughly  typical  illustration 
of  this  character  will  serve  at  once  to  show  how  completely  the  medical 
world  is  frequently  hypnotized  by  a vicious  theory,  and  also  the  possi- 
bilities for  evil  that  follow  the  giving  of  arbitrary  or  compulsory 
power  to  men  in  empirical  or  theoretical  fields. 

In  the  eighteenth  century  the  medical  world  came  under  the  sway 
of  the  idea  that  by  inoculating  the  people  with  smallpox  virus,  it 
could  best  handle  the  smallpox.  At  the  beginning,  some  experimenters 
assumed  that  if  a patient  were  first  treated  medically,  in  order  to 
bring  the  body  into  a healthy  condition,  and  were  then  inoculated, 
he  would  have  smallpox  in  a comparatively  light  form.  The  first 
cases  seemed  to  confirm  the  experimenters’  theory,  and  soon  the  pro- 
fession was  as  completely  psychologized  by  the  idea  as  it  is  to-day 
by  serum  therapy.  Up  to  the  time  of  this  unfortunate  experiment 
by  physicians  in  inoculating  smallpox,  the  disease  was  not  especially 
dreaded,  nor  were  epidemics  of  frequent  occurrence,  according  to 
the  best  medical  authority  of  the  age ; but  as  soon  as  the  doctors 
began  their  wholesale  inoculation,  using  the  virus  of  smallpox,  the 
disease  spread  with  amazing  rapidity  and  the  mortality  became  some- 
thing appalling — so  much  so  that  the  eighteenth  century  has  come 
to  be  known  as  the  smallpox  century.  Yet  in  spite  of  this  fearful 
tribute  of  life,  sacrificed  on  the  altar  of  a medical  delusion,  the  doctors 
were  so  obsessed  with  the  idea  that  this  was,  to  voice  the  dictum  of 
the  Royal  College  of  Physicians  of  London,  in  1774,  a treatment 
“highly  salutary  to  the  human  race,”  that  in  England  Parliament 
found  it  necessary  to  pass  a statute  in  1840  making  inoculation  of 
smallpox  in  England  a penal  offense,  in  order  to  protect  the  people 
from  the  deadly  delusion  of  the  profession. 

And  this  is  but  one  of  numerous  examples  that  might  be  cited 
showing  how  armies  of  men,  women  and  children  have  been  sacrificed 
on  the  altar  of  medical  delusions  which  have  possessed  the  brain  of 
the  doctors  for  a season,  only  at  length  to  be  discarded. 

Now  to  insist  on  compulsion  in  such  an  experimental  or  empirical 
realm  is  to  turn  our  backs  on  the  greatest  and  most  civilization- 
advancing  truths  that  mark  the  forward  march  of  mankind  since  the 
advent  of  modern  times  and  the  dawn  of  democracy. 

Many  good  people,  earnest,  conscientious  and  philanthropic  people, 
have  been  misled  by  the  adroit,  but  shallow  and  sophistical,  reason- 
ings of  the  representatives  of  the  American  Medical  Association,  who 
have  pointed  to  the  work  which  has  been  done  by  city,  state  and 
nation  in  commercial  and  scientific  fields  for  the  improvement  of 
general  conditions,  and  from  this  they  have  argued  in  favor  of  medical 
compulsion  on  the  assumption  that  medicine  was  a science  instead 
of  an  art  where  theories  are  ever  changing  and  where  accredited  rep- 


resentatives  hold  mutually  exclusive  theories  relating  to  a matter  which 
next  to  man’s  spiritual  well-being  touches  vitally  on  the  most  precious 
and  intimate  things  of  life. 

If  we  would  look  for  something  truly  analogous  to  the  health 
rights  of  the  individual,  we  will  find  it  in  their  religious  rights. 
It  took  centuries  of  martyrdom — aye,  martyrdom  that  is  not  yet 
ended — to  measurably  establish  the  right  of  the  individual  freely 
to  enjoy  the  spiritual  physician  or  adviser  of  his  choice ; and  for 
twenty-five  years  the  people  of  our  various  states  have  had  to  battle 
with  an  increasingly  determined  and  aggressive  organized  medical 
body  which,  under  precisely  the  same  claim  as  that  of  the  Church  in 
the  bloody  days  of  the  Reformation — the  public  good — has  sought  to 
secure  medical  restrictive  legislation  that  would  take  from  millions 
of  intelligent  citizens  the  right  to  the  practitioners  of  their  choice  and 
compel  them  to  accept  doctors  in  whom  they  had  no  faith,  to  the 
immense  pecuniary  gain  of  the  law-protected  medical  class. 


V.  Class  Interests  Impair  Judgment 

A special  class,  with  the  interest  of  its  members  ever  present,  is 
very  liable  to  magnify  out  of  all  true  proportion  measures  that  would 
increase  the  power  and  revenue  of  the  favored  class  and  its  members, 
while  ignoring  vital  causes.  To  illustrate,  let  us  take  as  a concrete 
example  the  child  question  in  the  City  of  New  York. 

According  to  the  Eleventh  Annual  Report  of  the  City  Superin- 
tendent of  Schools  to  the  Board  of  Education  of  the  City  of  New  York 
for  the  year  ending  July  31,  1909,  there  were  319,489  children  exam- 
ined by  the  physicians  from  the  Department  of  Health,  exclusive  of 
examinations  for  contagious  diseases.  The  report  of  the  Department 
of  Health  gives  the  number  as  323,344,  and  also  differs  widely  from 
the  school  report  in  its  other  figures.  According  to  the  report  of  the 
Department  of  Health,  242,048  pupils  examined  needed  medical  or 
surgical  treatment — that  is  74  per  cent,  of  the  whole  number  examined. 

The  report  to  the  Board  of  Education  says : “Unfortunately  there 
is  no  statement  made  by  the  Department  of  Health  as  to  the  effective- 
ness of  the  treatments  given.”  The  physicians  seem  to  have  passed 
as  many  as  they  could  “through  the  mill,”  and  as  rapidly  as  possible. 
There  is  no  evidence  to  show  that  the  examinations  were  other  than 
absolutely  perfunctory.  They  appear  to  have  been  as  casual  as  the 
counting  of  sheep  as  they  are  loaded  into  a freight  car  from  their  pens. 

By  far  the  most  numerous  defects  found,  except  defective  teeth, 
were  those  affecting  the  nose  and  throat : “Adenoids,  hypertrophied 
tonsils,  defective  nasal  breathing,”  etc.  It  is  also  mentioned  that  nearly 
12,000  pupils  were  found  suffering  from  malnutrition,  caused  by 
inferior  food  or  by  lack  of  any  sort  of  food  at  all. 

The  Bureau  of  Municipal  Reasearch  of  New  York  City  is  a body 
that  has  been  in  existence  a number  of  years.  It  is  supported  by 
private  subscriptions  and  is  famous  for  its  honesty.  It  is  incorruptible 
and  has  fought  for  honest  government  in  every  branch  of  the  municipal 
administration.  It  is  more  feared  by  politicians  than  any  other  bureau 
of  the  sort  in  the  city.  In  the  New  York  Times  of  February  7th,  1910, 
it  accused  Dr.  W.  H.  Maxwell,  City  Superintendent  of  Schools  of 


11 


New  York  City,  of  bad  faith  and  the  use  of  facts  known  to  be  untrust- 
worthy. It  said : 

“In  attempting  to  make  a scapegoat  of  adenoids  and  en- 
larged glands  the  Health  Department  and  the  City  Superin- 
tendent confuse  every  issue  involved,  and  prevent  the  public 
from  seeing  what  steps  it  ought  to  take  to  prevent  and  remedy 
either  physical  defects  or  that  waste  of  millions  annually  to 
which  children  behind  their  proper  grade  testify.  Not  a 
word  do  we  hear  of  sweatshops  in  the  schoolroom;  not  a 
word  about  breakdowns,  due  to  overwork  at  school  and  at 
home;  not  a word  of  ventilation  evils  that  could  easily  be 
corrected ; not  a wee  bit  of  responsibility  is  lodged  with  over- 
crowding, part  time,  unsuitable  curriculum,  inefficient  instruc- 
tion, inefficient  supervision,  or  well-intentioned,  but  ineffec- 
tive, methods  and  policies.” 

There  can  be  no  question,  for  instance,  that  a large  number  of 
children  suffer  from  defective  teeth.  It  does  not  take  a physician  or  a 
physical  examination,  however,  to  impress  upon  their  minds  the 
necessity  of  a clean  mouth,  or  to  instruct  them  in  the  use  of  the  tooth- 
brush. They  can  learn  from  their  teachers  that  the  toothbrush  is 
mightier  than  the  dentist. 

While  bad  teeth  is  one  of  the  great  causes  of  poor  health  among 
children,  under  feeding,  due  to  ignorance  and  poverty  is  not  far 
behind.  It  has  been  brought  out  by  Dr.  E.  Mather  Sill,  in  his  clinic 
on  the  lower  East  Side,  in  New  York  City,  that  83  per  cent,  of  the 
juvenile  population  in  that  densely  populated  region  get  practically 
nothing  but  bread  and  slops  to  eat.  Under  improved  diet  these  chil- 
dren gain  as  much  as  a pound  and  a half  a week  and  their  mentality 
grows  quite  as  fast.  There  is  not  a word  from  Dr.  Sill  about  adenoids 
or  things  of  that  sort.  But  he  has  much  to  say  about  the  necessity 
of  bathing  and  of  adequate  ventilation  in  the  home  and  the  school- 
room. 

The  matter  of  proper  ventilation  is  a practical  one  that  needs 
an  architect  rather  than  a physician  to  solve.  Bad,  foul  air  causes 
all  sorts  of  illness.  To  discover  and  to  remedy  this  trouble  no  physical 
examination  of  the  school  children  is  necessary.  Pure  air  is  univer- 
sally recognized  as  one  of  the  great  necessities  of  life. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  the  Department  of  Health  claims 
that  74  per  cent,  of  the  pupils  examined  needed  medical  or  surgical 
treatment.  According  to  the  doctors  looking  for  abnormal  conditions 
almost  three-fourths  of  all  the  children  examined  called  for  medical 
treatment.  What  a tremendous  increase  in  the  doctors’  revenues 
would  result  from  compulsory  medical  treatment. 


VI.  Fundamental  Cause  of  Evil  Conditions 

The  compulsory  inspection  of  school  children  and  its  corollary, 
compulsory  medication,  are  at  once  based  on  false  premises  or  assump- 
tions, are  palliative  makeshifts  of  doubtful  value  and  fraught  with 
grave  evils,  wholly  inimical  to  the  rights  of  the  citizen  and  the 
cause  of  scientific  progress ; and  they  impose  enormous  burdens  of 
taxation  on  the  people,  while  tending  to  build  up  an  autocratic,  dog- 


12 


matic  and  intolerant  medical  trust  or  monopoly.  Furthermore,  they 
serve  to  divert  the  public  mind  from  great  economic  ivrongs  that  are 
root  causes  of  the  evils  complained  of.  Involuntary  poverty,  child 
labor,  the  disease-breeding  and  overcrowded  tenements,  the  sweat- 
shops and  other  unnecessary  evils — evils  that  would  not  be  possible 
under  just  economic  conditions,  are  major  factors  in  the  stunted  and 
benumbed  brains  and  physically  defective  bodies  of  an  army  of  little 
ones  to-day.  The  parents  and  ancestors  of  many  of  these  children 
have  long  been  the  victims  of  social  injustice,  and  much  is  doubtless 
due  to  inherited  weakness,  which  is  reinforced  by  our  evil  economic 
conditions. 

Monopoly  in  land,  that  enables  men  to  hold  from  their  fellow  men 
the  use  of  the  earth,  for  selfish,  speculative  purposes,  which  is  a large 
factor  in  the  overcrowding  of  people  in  cities;  the  employment  of 
great  armies  of  children  in  mines  and  factories  and  mills  when  they 
should  be  in  the  open  air  and  in  school,  developing  body,  brain  and 
soul;  the  toleration  of  tenements  in  our  cities  that  are  great  disease- 
breeding centers,  innocent  of  proper  sanitary  provisions  and  pro- 
visions for  air  and  sunshine ; the  overcrowding  of  human  beings  in 
small  apartments,  in  cellars  and  in  attics  of  the  slums  of  our  great 
cities — these  and  similar  economic  conditions,  due  to  the  greed  and 
avarice  of  man  and  the  indifference  of  government  to  the  demands 
of  justice  and  human  rights  that  are  the  fundamental  principles  on 
which  democracy  rests,  are  root  causes  to  be  considered  by  those  who 
really  desire  to  eradicate  the  evils  complained  of.  And  the  campaign 
to  remedy  these  conditions  should  be  complemented  with  general 
instruction  of  the  children  everywhere  in  regard  to  the  importance 
of  pure  air,  water,  sunshine,  exercise  and  food — questions  about  which 
there  are  no  warring  opinions. 

But  the  men  who  wish  to  perpetuate  unjust  economic  conditions, 
they  who  are  coining  money  out  of  the  life  and  health  of  the  children, 
they  who  are  getting  rich  on  tenements  that  promote  both  moral  and 
physical  death,  and  they  who  through  monopoly  in  land  and  other 
things  are  becoming  abnormally  rich  by  depriving  their  fellow  men 
of  things  to  which  they  are  entitled — all  these  persons  are  quite  ready 
to  help  the  office-seeking  political  doctors  to  comfortable  seats  on  the 
backs  of  the  taxpayers,  because  through  this  aid  to  a great  privilege- 
seeking class  the  aroused  conscience  of  the  community  is  being  diverted 
from  the  root  causes  of  the  evil.  Furthermore,  they  are  thus  aiding 
in  building  up  another  privilege-seeking  class,  which  in  turn  will 
strengthen  the  feudalism  of  privileged  wealth  and  reaction  in  its  battle 
against  equality  of  opportunities  and  of  rights  for  all  the  people. 

Unfortunate  conditions,  here  &s  elsewhere,  call  for  remedial 
agencies,  but  those  agencies  look  to  the  abolition  of  special  privileges 
that  place  the  people  at  the  mercy  of  protected  classes  and  enable 
them  to  levy  unjust  tribute  from  industry  at  every  turn,  and  the  enact- 
ment of  wise  general  legislation  that  shall  make  for  economic  inde- 
pendence and  health  through  wholesome  environment;  but  they  do 
not  call  for  legislation  that  shall  create  an  army  of  tax-supported  state 
doctors,  who  will  more  and  more  owe  their  positions  to  the  favor  of 
politicians. 


13 


VII.  Compulsory  Inspection  and  a Great  Privilege- 
Seeking  Organized  Class 

The  present  demand  for  compulsory  inspection  of  school  children 
is  due  chiefly  to  a long  campaign  diligently  pushed  forward  by  the 
perfectly  organized  American  Medical  Association,  since  that  body 
was  reorganized  with  political  doctors  in  control.  The  placing  of  the 
people  in  the  hands  of  the  favored  doctors,  so  that  they  will  be  forced 
to  employ  them,  and  the  burdening  of  the  taxpayers  with  an  ever- 
increasing  army  of  state-paid  doctors  are  master  aims  of  the  men  who 
to-day  control  the  American  Medical  Association. 

Monopoly  in  commercial  commodities  is  oppressive  and  burden- 
some, but  its  tax  is  merely  upon  the  pocketbook  of  the  citizen. 
Monopoly  in  religion  or  medicine  is  a hundredfold  more  intolerable, 
because  in  addition  to  the  tax  upon  the  pocketbook  it  seeks  to  compel 
a large  proportion  of  the  people  to  do  violence  to  their  conscience  by 
yielding  to  teachers  and  practitioners  in  whom  they  do  not  believe  and 
whose  theories  in  many  instances  are  abhorrent  to  them.  Thus  it  tends 
to  make  the  law-loving  citizen  a law-defying  citizen ; for  in  matters 
so  intimate  and  vital  as  the  spiritual  or  physical  health,  the  rights 
of  the  individual  are  too  sacred  to  be  disregarded  at  the  instigation 
of  a monopoly-seeking  class. 

Moreover,  the  inauguration  of  this  compulsory  medical  inspection 
will  inevitably  lead  to  a union  of  the  political  grafters  and  the  medical 
grafters  and  will  further  bulwark  the  political  boss  and  the  money- 
controlled  machine.  Already  ugly  charges  are  being  made  where  the 
innovation  has  been  effected.  A luminous  illustration  of  its  baleful 
and  demoralizing  influence  is  found  in  the  recent  masterly  arraign- 
ment of  the  medical-political  combine  in  Boston,  by  Dr.  David  B. 
Scannell,  formerly  member  of  the  school  board,  before  the  Woman’s 
Auxiliary  of  the  Massachusetts  Civil  Service  Reform  Association,  in 
Boston,  on  February  13th.  In  the  course  of  his  remarks,  Dr.  Scan- 
nell said : 

“Boston  school  doctors,  after  inspecting  the  isolation  of  a con- 
tagious case,  whether  the  isolation  is  perfect  or  not,  often  go  directly 
into  the  schoolroom.  This  is  done  frequently. 

“Some  Boston  school  teachers  help  out  certain  of  these  doctors 
by  putting  a sign  in  the  schoolroom  window  indicating  to  the  doctor 
as  he  passes,  that  he  need  not  stop  to  make  the  daily  visit  required 
by  the  city  regulations. 

“There  used  to  be  forty  inspectors  and  now  there  are  eighty. 
Is  any  inquiry  made  as  to  a doctor’s  ability?  No!  Does  he  take  any 
examination?  No!  How  is  he  appointed?  By  the  Board  of  Health. 
Does  it  really  appoint  him?  No!  The  appointments  are  made  by 
the  mayor  at  the  wish  of  this  and  that  friend.  The  regulations  say  the 
doctor  must  visit  his  school  every  day.  Does  he  do  so?  Sometimes.” 

Since  the  American  Medical  Association  has  entered  politics 
and  perfected  a nation-wide  political  machine  of  great  efficiency,  it 
has  developed  three  definite  lines  of  action,  all  looking  to  the  one  end 
of  establishing  a medical  hierarchy  as  supreme  in  power  as  was  the 
Church  in  the  Dark  Ages.  (1)  It  is  seeking  to  secure  a National 


14 


Medical  Department,  with  a doctor  as  a cabinet  officer.  (2)  It  is 
striving  for  monopoly  state  legislation  that  would  take  from  millions 
of  intelligent  citizens  the  privilege  of  employing  the  practitioner  of 
their  choice,  thus  greatly  increasing  the  financial  revenues  of  the  trust- 
protected  doctors.  (3)  It  is  industriously  striving  to  introduce  com- 
pulsory medical  inspection  and  kindred  measures  to  secure  an  ever- 
increasing  army  of  state-supported  physicians,  knowing  that  the  gen- 
eral introduction  of  compulsory  medical  examination  would  be  a giant 
stride  toward  the  establishment  of  state  medicine ; and,  indeed,  through 
this  threefold  line  of  advance  the  American  Medical  Association  counts 
on  establishing  a gigantic  medical  hierarchy  which  shall  control  the 
people  from  birth  to  death. 

The  proposed  compulsory  medical  inspection,  like  the  monopoly 
legislation  which  the  association  is  ceaselessly  striving  to  obtain  through 
its  state  branches,  and  the  bureaucratic  rule  it  hopes  to  secure  in  the 
national  government,  is  un-American  in  essence  and  spirit.  It  is 
monopolistic  in  the  most  offensive  sense,  in  that  it  not  only  demands 
that  the  people  be  placed  under  tribute  to  the  privileged  class,  but 
it  disregards  the  conscientious  scruples  of  intelligent  citizens  in  a field 
that  history  and  experience  prove  to  he  thoroughly  empirical. 

VIII.  It  Would  Enormously  Increase  the 
Burden  of  Taxation 

The  question  of  taxation  is  more  and  more  engaging  the  attention 
of  serious  and  conscientious  publicists.  City  after  city,  owing  to 
reckless  extravagance  and  the  vicious  practice  of  machine  politicians 
of  enlarging  the  army  of  public  servants,  is  already  approaching  its 
borrowing  limit ; while  in  state  and  nation  the  expenses  of  government, 
which  means  the  burden  of  taxes,  are  being  so  rapidly  and  abnormally 
swelled  that  the  question  of  any  large  increase  in  expenditure  calls 
for  the  most  serious  consideration. 

Especially  is  this  true  when  the  new  demand  for  increased  taxes 
is  in  the  nature  of  a perpetual  'and  ever-growing  drain  on  the  pockets 
of  the  people,  as  would  inevitably  be  the  case  where  an  army  of 
state-supported  doctors  is  added  to  the  public  payroll ; because  expe- 
rience proves  that  when  an  army  of  pensioners,  backed  by  a powerful 
privilege-seeking  organization,  has  once  fastened  itself  on  the  govern- 
ment, its  number  and  the  expense  steadily  and  rapidly  increase.  And 
this  is  all  the  more  certain  under  political  conditions  such  as  obtain 
at  present,  with  political  bosses  and  the  masters  of  the  party  machines 
eager  to  make  deals  and  enter  into  alliances  that  promise  to  give  them 
added  power. 

If  the  proposed  innovation,  however,  were  not  open  to  such  serious 
objections — objections  which  in  the  minds  of  hundreds  of  thousands  of 
intelligent  citizens  far  outweigh  any  possible  good  that  can  be  derived 
from  them — the  case  would  be  different.  Furthermore,  if  there  were 
not  other  remedial  agencies  that  would  yield  far  greater  benefits  at  a 
less  expense  and  that  are  fundamentally  just,  while  in  no  way  con- 
flicting with  the  rights  and  convictions  of  the  citizens,  instead  of,  as  in 
this  case,  advancing  the  interests  of  a monopoly  or  trust-seeking  class, 


15 


there  would  be  far  less  reason  for  determined  opposition  to  the  pro- 
posed step  toward  state  medicine. 

We  are  of  those  who  would  favor  the  state  going  far — very  far — 
to  remedy  the  wrongs  that  work  injury  to  the  weak  and  unfortunate, 
especially  when  the  evils  affect  the  young;  but  we  unhesitatingly 
oppose  the  fastening  on  the  body  politic  of  representatives  of  a favored 
school  of  medicine  whose  theory  and  practice  do  not  commend  them- 
selves to  a great  number  of  intelligent  citizens,  in  lieu  of  wise,  states- 
manlike and  sound  democratic  remedial  agencies. 

Money  spent  for  educating  the  people  and  effecting  legislative 
changes  that  shall  so  shackle  conscienceless  greed  as  to  liberate  the 
army  of  little  children  in  mines,  mills  and  factories,  is  money  well 
spent.  Money  devoted  to  effecting  through  education  and  enlightened 
legislation  the  destruction  of  special  privilege  and  private  monopoly, 
and  the  realization  for  the  people  of  equality  of  opportunities  and  of 
rights,  would  be  a wise  expenditure.  Money  spent  for  transforming 
the  slums  from  breeding-centers  of  moral  contagion,  mental  stagnation 
and  physical  disease,  into  healthy  and  habitable  spots  for  twentieth 
century  civilization,  would  also  represent  wise  expenditure.  The  con- 
demning, buying  and  tearing  down  of  disease-breeding  tenements  and 
rookeries  and  the  making  of  parks  and  open-air  gymnasiums  in  con- 
gested districts,  is  another  work  that  may  well  challenge  the  approval 
of  enlightened  citizenship.  The  dissemination,  through  books  written 
in  a popular  vein  and  by  teachers,  of  the  universally  accepted  and 
extremely  important  general  truths  relating  to  the  importance  of  fresh 
air,  sunshine,  exercise,  cleanliness  and  food  values,  together  with  equal 
emphasis  on  the  great  moral  health  verities  essential  to  a robust 
character — the  teaching  of  the  vital  worth  and  importance  of  such 
things  as  honor,  truth,  honesty,  sincerity,  nobility,  faith,  duty  and 
kindness — truths  that  make  for  physical  health  and  character  develop- 
ment, would  call  forth  no  opposition  from  the  hundreds  of  thousands 
of  intelligent  and  conscience-guided  Americans  who  are  resolutely 
opposed  to  the  encroachments  of  the  organized  monopoly-seeking 
advocates  of  state  medicine. 

We  have  long  held  that  the  children  in  our  schools  should  be 
developed  morally,  mentally  and  physically ; that  intellectual  training 
should  go  hand  in  hand  with  general  information  relative  to  the  value 
and  importance  of  the  fundamental  and  universally  accepted  truths 
essential  to  physical  and  moral  well-being.  But  while  believing  in  all 
these  things  and  believing  that  the  Republic  can  safely  go  far  in 
advancing  such  wise  and  just  work,  we  are  unalterably  opposed  to 
state  medicine,  state  religion  or  special  privilege  being  extended  to 
any  sects  or  schools,  in  religion,  philosophy  or  medicine,  just  as  we 
are  unreservedly  opposed  to  private  monopoly  and  special  privilege  in 
business  or  commercial  life. 


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The  Willett  Press,  New  Yorlt' 


